Dr. Dre

From House Party to House Music: A Wild Friday Night In Houston

With a perfect combination of sun, clouds, and breeze, It felt as if Houston was making love to me as I escaped the treacherous, life-sucking fluorescent lighting of my Westchase office and moon-walked my way towards a Friday night full of booze, buds, and Budweiser. (I'm more of a Saint Arnold's dr ... More >>

Stick to Rhymin': Five Awesomely Terrible Acting Performances by Rappers

In today's recording industry, it is essential to be multifaceted. How can you knock a person spiting ill bars over their own beat in the video they directed? Indeed, most rappers are exploring many different avenues and mediums these days. Some are actually finding additional success; while others ... More >>

Cypress Hill

Reader's Poll: The Best 40 Albums of 1992

As we close out our 1992 week here on Rocks Off -- part nostalgia trip, part making you all feel old -- we look at the best albums of that year. The rock-music world was still on a Nirvana high, and the fruits of Cali hip-hop were ripening, with widely praised and consumed albums from Dr. Dre and Ic ... More >>

The James Gang: Houston's Leela Updates the Great Etta

How do you remake a song as iconic as Etta James' "At Last"? Should you? That's the question Houston's Leela James had to confront on her new project Loving You More... In the Spirit of Etta James, a tribute to the R&B legend who died this past January. Rocks Off first encountered Leela when we w ... More >>

Down With the Kings: Rick Ross' "3 Kings" vs. Slim Thug's "3 Kingz"

One of my favorite stories as a kid was Arthur and The Knights of the Round Table. Or The Sword In the Stone, if you liked things animated. Had everything you really wanted in terms of inspiration -- kid always picked on, thought to be of no use to the world then gets courage from a few people, push ... More >>

Laughing & Rhyming: 4 Great Hip Hop/Comedy Crossovers

Fans of Childish Gambino can be split in to two groups: those who like hip hop and appreciate his wordplay, and those who use the phrase "I don't normally like hip-hop but..." before admitting that they just happen to like the guy from Community a lot. That he's a strong enough on the mike to gain t ... More >>

Rap Round Table: Wu-Tang vs. N.W.A. vs. A Tribe Called Quest

Some rappers happen to be thoughtful, intelligent people. Each week, Rocks Off will have some of them here discussing issues relevant to their culture. This Week's Panel: Mic Skills, E.S.G., Chingo Bling, D-Risha, Kiotti, Mac, Yung Redd, Damien Randle, Yung Truth, Fat Tony Not Invited: Whoever gav ... More >>

Who's Got the Power?: The Musicians On Forbes's Most Powerful Celebrities List

Fame and fortune might not be the ultimate goal for every person to ever write a song or learn an instrument, but it is for a lot of people out there. It would be lovely to believe that music is done 100% of the time for the "right" reasons, but most of us are cynical enough to know otherwise. Some ... More >>

You Got Served: The Top 10 Legal Battles In Rock History

Ten years ago last week, one of the most vicious legal battles in rock history took another ugly turn. Ex-Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic and drummer Dave Grohl found themselves in King County Superior Court over a dispute with Kurt Cobain's widow, Courtney Love, over the band's considerable royalti ... More >>

Coachella: Best Of Weekend 2, Day 3

Sunday, our friends at LA Weekly and OC Weekly trekked out to the desert for one more day -- ed. By the third day of Coachella's second weekend -- the sixth and final day of this year's festival -- folks had more or less learned to ignore the dust and the heat. Here are our intrepid writers' favor ... More >>

The Best & Worst-Case Scenarios For The Future Of Musical Holograms

Like most night owls, I spent early Monday morning watching YouTube clips of a holographic Tupac Shakur playing Coachella with his friends Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg nearly 16 years after his death. It was at once creepy and crass, but altogether interesting no matter how you sliced it, and not just bec ... More >>

Beats By Dre, Monster Headphones To Split

​Well time to pass the tissue to those of you who love walking through IAH or Hobby with $200 headphones around your head like a fashion statement. In news more likely to occur than Dr. Dre's Detox album, Monster has announced that it will no longer be making Beats By Dre headphones. Chalk up an ... More >>

Tori, Tool, TLC And The Other Musical Debuts Of 1992

1992 was a pretty heady year for music in general, with the masses gobbling up all the gangsta rap, grunge, and pop-country they could. That year would see the release of not only R.E.M.'s Automatic For The People, Peter Gabriel's Us, Pantera's Vulgar Display Of Power, but also what is arguably The ... More >>

Forrest Gump & Other "Generation-Defining" Soundtracks

​The Forrest Gump soundtrack debuted on June 28, 1994, a week ahead of the film itself, which would go on to smash box-office records, win numerous awards and become one of the most beloved movies of the past 20 years. It is still endlessly quotable, emotional, and entertaining, and the soundt ... More >>

Top 5 Weed-Inspired Album Titles

​Moments ago, actually earlier this afternoon now, Rocks Off opened an envelope from Universal Music that turned out to contain young No Limit-affiliated rapper Curren$y's major-label debut, Weekend at Burnie's (Warner Bros.). We'll give you three guesses what the New Orleans native's primary ... More >>

The 25 Most Influential Music Videos Of All Time

​It's hard to fathom a time before music videos, and it's even sadder to remember when channels like MTV and VH1 were wall-to-wall music videos. In between there was a golden age, when with every clip that you watched could spark a revolution in you, or at least change your fashion sense. It's ... More >>

Eminem Vs. Gaga; Nicki Minaj Vs. Britney: Who Wins?

The hip-hop world is a less than sensible place - lots of times, you're even required to clarify when bad means bad and when bad means good - so once a week we're going to get with a rapper and ask them to explain things. Something you always wanted to ask a rapper? Email sheaserrano@gmail.com.  ... More >>

Saturday Night: Rusko At Warehouse Live

Photos by Jody Perry​Rusko, Doorly Warehouse Live May 7, 2011 See more young local dubsteppers from Saturday in our slideshow. As any cranky old scenester will tell you, there comes a time when you feel that your favorite underground and underappreciated art form has been co-opted and corrup ... More >>

Rockin' In Plain Sight: Our Favorite Hidden Album Tracks

​In the days when compact discs and tapes ruled the world, hidden tracks on albums were like secret gifts from your favorite bands. Off the liner notes, not in the original track listings, and totally unassuming, sometimes tucked away after minutes and minutes of silence on a disc. With the ... More >>

Nate Dogg's Seven Best Hooks Besides "Regulate"

​Hip-hop lost a genius late Tuesday, when Nate Dogg passed away from causes unknown in Long Beach, Calif. Maybe the man upstairs needed this OG, who was 41 and had suffered strokes in 2007 and '08, to sing hooks in the choir. Meanwhile, Nate's work here on Earth will live on in hip-hop histor ... More >>

Five Terrible Rap Acts Who Will Never Crack the "Diddy List"

The Super Broker Shuffle: Your eyes and ears will never forgive you​I'm a sucker for lists, I've said that before. If it makes me a less cerebral person, so be it. I'm not apologizing. For a "list addict" like myself, Forbes magazine is like a big plate of list cocaine. They'll come up with a ... More >>

Five Songs That Huck Finn Guy Should Censor Next

gutenberg.org​As many of you probably already know, Alabama publisher NewSouth Inc. plans to release censored versions of Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, replacing the words "nigger" and "Injun" with "slave" and "Indian," respectively. That's ... More >>

The Most Anticipated Albums Of 2011

​NATIONAL White Lies, Ritual: They killed at festivals in 2008 and 2009, but do London's Interpol-styled lads have longevity? Dr. Dre, Detox: It's been on hold or gestating since at least Clinton was in office. Will it continue to be hip-hop's Chinese Democracy? R.E.M., Collapse Into No ... More >>

Remember Nosaprise's Horse Shoes and Hand Grenades?

Houston's history is dotted with albums that, fairly or un, have been swept aside. We'll examine them here. Have an album that you think nobody knows about but should? Email sheaserrano@gmail.com. Nosaprise Horse Shoes and Hand Grenades (self-released, 2010) ​For a while, it appeared that th ... More >>

Two Star Symphony Talks KTRU, Silent Films, Dr. Dre And Minor Threat

Two Star Symphony on Facebook​This week Rocks Off got a hot tip from our pal Jason that the venerable Two Star Symphony would be playing an evening gig out in Houston's western territories. It had been a good while since we'd seen the local string quartet, and with our Spidey Sense tingling ab ... More >>

Girl Talk Toilet Paper Mash-Ups Balloons = Party!

Marc Brubaker​ Aftermath didn't think it was possible to up the ante any more at this year's Summerfest until Girl Talk took the stage Saturday night. In our estimation, it was the biggest and baddest Summerfest party to date. We might even venture to say that achieved the biggest and baddest summ ... More >>

Top 5 Rapper "Secret" Identities

Rocks Off wonders what hip-hop would look like if rappers were true to who they really are, or should we say... who they were. Perhaps it would look like the video "Swagger Wagon," by The Sienna Family, the latest Internet phenomenon that has amassed 2.4 million hits in less than a month. Those G's ... More >>

5 Rappers Who Dissed The Radio, Sucka!

​ "Radio - suckers never play me" - Public Enemy, "Rebel Without a Pause" Eazy-E once walked up to legendary disc jockey Greg Mack and asked him what he could do to make his music radio-ready. Mack's reply? "Well, you could start by cleaning up the lyrics." Ever the savvy businessman, Eazy returne ... More >>

Pink Floyd, Dr. Dre, Velvet Underground and Other Artists We're Glad Discovered Drugs

It was 45 years ago this past Friday... that Bob Dylan met the Beatles for the first time and, more importantly for Rocks Off's purposes, introduced them to marijuana. While this meeting of musical titans would never lead to any actual musical collaboration or "Monsters of Hippie Rock" series of co ... More >>

Eminem: Relapse

Turning the Screw: Flatline & Trae, Eminem, T.I., Jay-Z, Nas & Kelis, The Kanye, Danger Mouse, Devin the Dude and More

Welcome back to Turning the Screw, Rocks Off's weekly rap post. It probably won't rhyme, at least most of the time. E-mail tips to introducingliston@gmail.com. Thanks, homies. Single of the Week: Flatline feat. Trae, "Fuckin' With Texas" Wire To Wire Eminem says he's the reason for the Chinese Demo ... More >>

The Game

A Few Rejected Inaugural Ball Theme Songs

Eminem feat. Dr. Dre & 50 Cent, "Crack A Bottle" The Good: Many bottles will be popped during tonight's festivities, we imagine, if not quite as many models. Also, the ongoing partnerships between this trio of rap titans says something about the present state of race relations in this country, ... More >>

Blog Critics' Greatest Rap CDs List

More of the same

Devin the Dude

Devin the Dude performs Sunday, April 29, at Bar Rio, 6400 Richmond, 832-251-9600.

The Game

Doctor's Advocate

Glazed Tracks

This sweet party is Dee place to be

It's In The Cards

The Nick-and-Jessica split, tarot-style

Hip-hop, Year Two AJ

Still no Jigga, but Kanye, some lovable limeys and a great Beyoncé substitute held it down

Boyz N the Studio

Hustle & Flow is short on action, long on scenes of recording

Rotation

Best Jukebox

Compton's (Back) N the House

Four discs trace the development of the original gangstas

Snoop Dogg

Saturday, June 8

Lean & Mean

Those who drink codeine syrup call it lean because of its most obvious effect: a loss of coordination. Those who study the drug call it liquid crack. Those who abuse it can wind up dead.

Accordion Corleone

Riding the Rap

A new book chronicles the bloody rise and fall of Death Row Records

Rotation

Rotation